To a Skylark
Hail to thee, blithe spirit!
Bird that never wert,
That from heaven, or near it,
Pourest thy full heart
In profuse strains of premeditated art.
Higher still and higher
From the earth thou springest
Like a cloud of fire;
The blue deep thou wingest,
And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest.
In the golden lightening
Of the setting sun,
O'er which clouds are brightening,
Thou dost float and run
Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun.
Percy Bysshe Shelley
Ah, Shelley. I guessed Keats when we were walking - close but no cigar.
ReplyDeleteJust found this one:
High Flight
Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds - and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of - wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long delirious, burning blue,
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew -
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high untresspassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand and touched the face of God.